Using viruses to deliver a gene of interest is a sort of standard thing in gene therapy and also now in vaccinology. We use two viruses to deliver Ebola genes: one is a nanovirus, and the other is a cow virus called vesicular stomatitis virus. Both produce very robust immune responses that protect monkeys against a thousandfold lethal challenge with Ebola. Also they have some efficacy post-exposure, so after somebody has been exposed accidentally to Ebola, it probably has a role in therapy.
This kind of gene therapy approach has a lot of different potential applications, in which I'm not an expert, but they would certainly include cancer and certain kinds of genetic deficiency diseases. It hasn't made its way into the mainstream yet for the most part, but we're forging ahead with commercialization of these two vaccines. We have companies that are interested. They either have licensed or are interested in licensing the technology, and over the next couple of years we will be doing some clinical trials with them.
The market for these vaccines is not huge. It's a niche market—military, the security community, laboratories. But I think within a couple of years, you'll see them commercially available.